Camp Red Lake
by Smasher006
Summary: AU on a different camp.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: **I do not own any Holes rights and am not Louis Sachar. Easy to know as I'm writing this onto a website, not a huge publishing corp.

Camp Red Lake.

Not that there was a lake. Or ever had been, at least for the past 200 years. It's just that mirages usually appear there, making it look like a lake is there.

Underneath the ground there was a mine. Every day boys and girls would dig in the mine, making it a bit bigger. The reason for this is most of these boys and girls had no choice. They had been bad. And if you make a bad person dig a mine repeatedly, they will turn into a good person.

At least, that's what people thought.

Dangers can always happen down a mine. You can hurt yourself with a pick-axe, hit your head on the ceiling. In worse cases the roof can fall down. You can survive that.

Mostly

But you don't want to get bitten by a devils fire snake. One bite and you're a goner. There's only death to look to.

Always

* * *

Nelson Noslen looked out the bus window. He smiled. He liked his name. So did the rest of his family. He was actually Nelson Noslen the 6th. When the first one realised it was spelt the same forwards as backwards, it stuck. 

He continued to look out the window. The heat was stifling, even with the air conditioning on. Looking out the window didn't help. Outside there was a desert that made his mouth incredibly dry. Staring outside didn't help. He wondered when he would see the lake.

He looked down at the sheet in front of him. It clearly stated 'Camp Red Lake Detention Centre', yet there wasn't any lake for miles around.

Nelson even remembered the judge saying "You can go to jail, or camp green lake. The choice is yours." Camp red lake sounded better.

He even committed a crime that he didn't do. It was (according to his farther) his great, great, great grandfather's fault, and otherwise known as his no-good-dirty-rotten-cow-stealing great, great, great grandfather.

Supposedly he had stolen a cow from a black tribesman, who put a curse on their family, but no-one really believed it. His mother certainly didn't, though every time she got something wrong she blamed him.

"Hey!" said the guard. Nelson jumped, he'd completely forgotten about him. He followed the guard off the bus, and entered camp red lake.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: **Again, I do not have anything to do with holes and am not Louis Sachar

The first thing that hit Nelson was the heat. The next was that there wasn't a lake.

It took a while to sink in. Why call a place Camp Red _Lake _if there wasn't a lake! It was red enough, but either this place is being run by maniacs or…

"Oi!" yelled the guard, prodding him in the back with his gun. "I'm not paid to stand around in the sweltering heat all day, shift!"

Nelson started walking. Not too far away was a series of about 12 small cabins, one large cabin and two slightly modern buildings next to each other. There also appeared to be an old mine shaft nearby. There didn't seem to be much in the way of 'character building' activities at all. Did all judges lie? Nelsons one had said about there being lots of activities there, but looking now there weren't.

They were nearly there now. They were heading for one of the modern buildings. When they got there the door was open for them, like someone expected them to come in. Inside there was a man sitting behind a desk with a cowboy hat on and a scorpion tattoo down one of his arms. He looked the kind of person you wouldn't want to meet in a dark alley at night.

In the corner was a large stack of chewing gum.

"You like your gum don't you." Said the guard

"Yep." said the man behind the desk. "It's the only way to stop me smoking." He had a rather gruff voice, which went with his look.

He turned to Nelson. "Welcome to Camp Read Lake. I personally didn't choose the name, but hey. My name is Mr Mister. Nothing else."

Nelson knew it couldn't possibly be his name, and tried to keep a straight face.

"You ain't no little kid no more. Now listen. You saw that mine shaft gettin here. That leads down to the work area. You are to dig into the gap between 2 pit props for 4 feet. The pickaxe you get will measure that. To say you're done, place two pit-props in the two corners of the new hole. Me and some of the other counsellors will secure them in place after you leave. Got That?"

Nelson had drifted away. He hastily said "Yes, Mr…..Mister."

"Good." Mr Mister walked over to a fridge and got out some water. He gave one to the guard, who then went back to the bus. Nelson looked hopeful at Mr Mister, but he didn't give him any.

"Too bad for you." Mr Mister said to Nelson, "Your going to be thirsty for a looong time."


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: **'ahem' I do not own holes and am not Louis Sachar. Thank you.

Mr Mister took Nelson to his cabin. There where twelve in total, six for boys and six for girls. Nelson wondered if he was going to have it for himself, or have to share it. He hoped for the first option.

Mr Mister showed Nelson in. Inside were seven beds, an old box by the side and 5 kids all lying on the bed. They didn't seem to notice Nelson and Mr Mister.

"I'll leave you to get acquainted with them" said Mr Mister. He then left.

"Ermmm……Hello?" said Nelson to the nearest boy.

"Hi" he said.

Seeing this achieved nothing he sat down on the one empty bed and took of his bag. He drummed on the side of his bed.

"Is anyone aware that I'm here?" Nelson called out. Nobody answered.

Seeing that he wasn't being noticed, he put his bag in the box beside his bed and collapsed on his bed. Maybe they'll be more co-operative later.

* * *

Two hours later someone came in. He had short hair, some stubble and wore a t-shirt and shorts that looked like they'd seen better days.

"Where's Nelson? I'd like to have a word with him" he said.

"There" said someone, pointing to Nelson.

"Thank you Neil" the man said.

"Its Criss-cross" said Neil, rather annoyed, "and that's Fish, Clamp, Foot, and Laser."

Nelson wondered who the next boy was, but kept his mouth shut.

"Well Nelson, I'm Mr Byranski, your group counsellor, and I'm here to make sure you can get the most out of camp red lake." The man said. "Meanwhile you'd better get some shut-eye. You've got a long day ahead of you tomorrow."


	4. Chapter 4

Clang!! Nelson woke up instantly. He checked his watch. 6:30! Who would be up this early doing what sounded like someone smashing two large pans together?

Clang!! "Get up!!" yelled Mr Mister. Nelson looked outside. He was banging two large pans together.

All the other boys were up and changing into their green jumpsuits, moaning. Nelson followed suit, though struggling because he must have chosen the wrong size.

He often forgot stuff and daydreamed. Back at school he'd not paid much attention in class, drifting off to Nelson land and falling back into reality when his French teacher asks him how to use '-ir' verbs and him ending up repeatedly in detentions for not paying attention.

All the other boys were heading to another modern building with 'Rec room and Canteen' on a door. All the girls were heading into another door that said the same thing, only on the other side of the building. Nelson guessed there wasn't going to be any chatting up between them or anything else too dirty for this book (sorry if this put any images in your head, just think of you favourite thing (that doesn't count any sick people out there who like that sort of thing) and now back to the book before I start wasting any more of your time).

Breakfast, if you call it that, was a lumpy stew that didn't really taste of anything, except mud. They also got some apple juice that had probably fermented and left to rot for a year, but at least it was better than the stew.

They then went out. Nelson looked up to the sky. He'd never seen so many stars before. Probably because there isn't that many lights around the place.

Mr Mister was fumbling with some keys outside a shed Nelson hadn't noticed before. It wasn't long before the door was open, revealing a load of pickaxes. Everyone was given one. There pick axes were big, four feet long according to Mr Mister.

All the boys from his group then went to the mine shaft. Nelson looked uneasy at it. It didn't seem to be very secure. When it was his turn to get on the small platform to be lowered down, he wasn't too nervous, but nervous all the same.

As it started to go lower, he felt a sense of upending doom was about to fall on him.

All of a sudden, the platform stopped, and then fell down at quite a speed.

Nelson screamed.


End file.
